Watching the scene from behind Uchiha Keizumi, Naruto felt his head spinning.
He couldn't help prodding Sasuke beside him, leaning in to whisper, "Hey, do you even get what he's saying?"
Sasuke shot Naruto a speechless glance and murmured back, "He thinks the Hyūga clan rules trump everything. And even if they don't trump everything, he at least puts them on the same level as the Land of Fire's laws, Konoha's rules, and the order of [Absolute Justice]."
Naruto blinked, muttering in doubt, "How can you even understand that?!"
Sasuke fell silent for a moment, then said, "Because he sounds just like some of the diehards in the Uchiha clan. In fact, I think he's even more hardheaded than they are."
"In people like that, clan rules are the highest rules. If the clan's rules clash with the rules of [Absolute Justice], they'll still think the clan's rules are the ones to obey."
Sasuke added, "And even if those rules clash with Konoha's, they'll think the same—and act the same."
Born into a great shinobi clan, Sasuke naturally knew the type.
After all, there were plenty of them among the Uchiha as well.
It was just that the Uchiha weren't as hidebound as the Hyūga. The Sharingan itself skews toward the extreme and rebellious; you can't expect everyone to dutifully cling to ossified house laws.
But from what Sasuke could see, everyone up and down the Hyūga clan seemed to venerate their house rules.
Especially that lot calling themselves the Hyūga Main House.
Even the Branch House—the ones being oppressed—were the same.
"What are you mumbling about, meow?!" A strangely accented voice cut in, making Hyūga Hiashi pause.
His gaze dropped to the orange ninja cat at Uchiha Keizumi's feet—the one that had just spoken human language.
Tachibana Jirō lifted his eyes, full of disdain, and met Hiashi's stare. "Meow—so what's next? You going to say the Main House are the 'true inheritors' of the Hyūga, and the Branch House are merely their 'guardians,' meow?"
"The Branch House must dutifully keep to a guardian's role and never, ever overstep the tiniest line, meow? And once they do overstep, feeling the agony of the Caged Bird cursed seal is only natural, meow?"
Hiashi said nothing—because the ninja cat had just said everything he'd been about to say next.
It was only the cat's tone that was so unfriendly that Hiashi couldn't shake the feeling the orange furball meant to insult him.
The very next second, that hunch came true.
The ill-mannered ninja cat actually let fly with crude words!
"Meow! Isn't that disgusting, Hyūga Hiashi!"
"'Inheritors'? 'Guardians'? Don't make me laugh, meow. You so-called Hyūga Main House shinobi just hide behind the Caged Bird cursed seal to enslave the Branch House—using death and pain to coerce them—so you can perch on top of everyone else, meow!"
"Byakugan with a seal versus Byakugan without a seal—that's your badge for who's above and who's beneath, meow! Stop crowning yourselves the 'heirs of the Hyūga bloodline.' From where I'm sitting, meow, the Hyūga Main House has been inbreeding so much your brains are about to go soft."
As Jirō went on, whether because he wasn't finished venting or because he'd found a new target, he suddenly turned his claws on the Branch House.
With a spring, he hopped onto Neji's shoulder; the weight nearly sent Neji pitching forward.
Jirō jabbed Neji's cheek with a paw. "And you in the Branch House—completely brainwashed by the Main House, meow? He tossed out a few pretty words and you were about to kowtow in gratitude, weren't you, meow? The dogs in the Inuzuka clan aren't this easy to train, and frankly, those dogs are treated better than you are, meow."
"At least if one of the Inuzuka's dogs tried to break its contract, an Inuzuka shinobi would still care enough to ask, meow: 'Why do you want to break the contract? Did some clansman treat you badly?'"
"Hyūga Branch House, listen up, meow! The moment you try to break a Caged Bird cursed seal you never wanted carved onto your heads, you're tortured within an inch of your lives. They don't see you as people—or even as dogs, meow!"
Neji's young face flushed scarlet.
"Just one line," Tachibana Jirō said. "The so-called Hyūga house rules are a twisted, pathological aberration spawned by the shinobi world, and 'Caged Bird' is the worst of those monstrosities, meow."
"Meow… I'm working myself up just saying it."
Having cursed to his heart's content, Tachibana Jirō muttered, mouth dry.
The entire Hyūga compound fell dead silent.
No one had expected a ninja cat to, in front of so many from both Main and Branch Houses, freely denounce the Hyūga—occasionally mixing in crude words.
Hyūga Hiashi had thought that by choosing to yield, he was being calm enough.
Yet after Jirō's tirade, a ripple broke across his tightly held expression. He realized that if he didn't speak now, then as clan head it would be tantamount to tacitly endorsing everything this ninja cat had said.
If these words spread…
The Hyūga would never be able to lift their heads again.
And the Branch House shinobi would surely be provoked.
Hiashi had already keenly noticed more than a few Branch House faces flushed red from those words.
From there, it could very well evolve into open conflict between Main and Branch—an ever-widening rift.
Even into armed conflict!
And once blades were drawn, even if the Main House could use the Caged Bird cursed seal to manipulate the Branch House at will, they could hardly slaughter every last Branch clansman… could they?
"The Caged Bird cursed seal was not created to enslave the Branch House, and the Main House has no desire to lord it over others," Hiashi said in a low voice. "Bloodline limits like the Byakugan are naturally coveted by enemies. Before the Caged Bird cursed seal existed, many Hyūga had their eyes plundered. To protect our people, one of our ancestors created the Caged Bird cursed seal.
"If anyone attempts to dig out a Byakugan, the Caged Bird seal will destroy it on its own. Over time, many in the shinobi world came to realize the Hyūga Byakugan cannot be stolen. In this way, it protects our clansmen from being hunted."
"Phew. That is why the Caged Bird cursed seal is engraved. It is not the oppression and exploitation you outsiders imagine."
"Is that so?" Uchiha Keizumi asked, voice flat. "Then why doesn't the Main House carve the Caged Bird onto themselves?"
Hiashi answered by reflex: "Because the Branch House already serves as the Main House's guardians. Naturally, the Main House does not need the Caged Bird."
The moment the words left his mouth, the scene dropped into silence again.
One Branch shinobi after another stared at Hiashi in shock.
"Why?" A youthful voice cut through the hush, startlingly clear.
Hyūga Neji had spoken. He lifted his head to meet Hiashi's eyes, biting out his confusion: "Why must the Branch House be the Main House's guardians? Why must we die for the Main House? As Keizumi-sama said… if the Main House also branded themselves with the Caged Bird, wouldn't there be no need for the Branch House to serve as guardians—no need for us to be the Main House's sacrificial scapegoats?"
Neji had been stung by Tachibana Jirō's words, and he didn't even know where the courage came from to spill everything in his heart.
"The Hyūga clan has had the divide between Main House and Branch House for hundreds—nearly a thousand—years."
A slightly hoarse, weighted voice sounded from the side as a Hyūga Main House elder walked over at an unhurried pace. "Neji, as Hizashi's son, do you not understand this?"
"If outsiders misunderstand the Hyūga, so be it—do you also misunderstand the Hyūga? Even Hiashi, as clan head, will one day divide his two daughters between Main House and Branch."
"So long as Hyūga blood runs in your veins, no one can escape house rules, and no one can break ancestral law."
"Ancestral law cannot be changed—this is the Hyūga clan's nindō."
Here, the Main House elder stopped, his gaze fixing on the two heads on the ground, stained red with blood.
He drew a deep breath; the wrinkles on his face twitched, but he did not erupt. Instead, he addressed Uchiha Keizumi with composure: "Uchiha Keizumi, your duty under [Absolute Justice] is to purge the shinobi world's evils. Our Hyūga house rules do not fall within your remit, do they?"
"Having killed two 'Hyūga villains,' you should have fulfilled your duty. The rest is not something your [Absolute Justice] nindō—or the Uchiha clan—has any place to meddle in."
And yet—
To his astonishment, the Main House elder realized Uchiha Keizumi ignored him completely.
The extremely dangerous young man suddenly turned and, in an icy tone, put a question to Hyūga Neji: "Brat, what do you think 'justice' is?"
The abrupt question seemed to come out of nowhere. Not only Hiashi and the others were puzzled; even Neji himself was taken aback.
He hadn't expected Uchiha Keizumi to address him of his own accord.
"Justice…"
For some reason, words Naruto and Uchiha Sasuke had once spoken to him surfaced in Neji's mind.
Those had been very upright theories of justice, and they had left a deep impression.
But before Neji could hurry to answer, Uchiha Keizumi's voice sounded again: "Order, fairness, impartiality, morality, punishing evil, promoting good… and so on—do you take those to be justice?"
"Yes!"
This time Neji answered quickly, afraid he would be cut off again before he could speak.
"Have you seen fairness and impartiality within the Hyūga clan?"
"Do you believe the Hyūga clan's order is a positive order?"
"Is the morality you have witnessed—or obey—actually correct?"
One relentless question after another came at Neji, each borne on a chill voice.
As the questions fell, the expressions of the Main House elder and Hyūga Hiashi visibly shifted.
"I…"
Neji felt many eyes on him—Hiashi's among them, and the elder's as well.
Is the Hyūga clan fair? Is it impartial?
He couldn't help raising a hand to his forehead. He thought of his father becoming a scapegoat for the Main House; of Hyūga Yokogari, who was tortured for merely attempting to break the Caged Bird; and of Tachibana Jirō poking his cheek while saying those words.
It certainly isn't fair.
It certainly isn't impartial either.
And the moral code the Hyūga follow must be wrong as well.
Those within the Hyūga, blinded by their own position, might not feel it—but when a ninja cat shouts it in your face, Neji suddenly realized that some of his own thoughts had already been tainted by the Hyūga's distorted morality.
What was keeping him from embracing [Absolute Justice] wasn't his own hesitation, nor his instinctive fear of Uchiha Keizumi.
It was the Hyūga's clan-specific moral creed—so different from others in Konoha, and rooted so deeply—that it was binding him fast.
If the Caged Bird was a prison of the flesh, then that entrenched morality was a prison of the mind—
—the thing that trapped his father, that trapped him…
—leaving neither of them any way to escape.
"Your answer is written all over your face."
Uchiha Keizumi drew back his gaze and gave a bland glance to the Hyūga Main House elder, whose expression had gone slightly rigid.
"Justice's duty is not merely to arrest or judge the guilty. When it is confronted with warped thinking and pathological rules that violate justice, justice has both the responsibility and the obligation to set them straight. Otherwise, such distortions will breed a vast multitude of crimes."
"Now then."
"Are you going to obstruct the execution of justice?!"
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